


Prepare A Face To Meet The Faces That You Meet

by Emamel



Series: Slow gold but everlasting [2]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Brotherhood AU, Ed Swears, Gen, Homunculus Alphonse Elric, Homunculus Edward Elric, Not that Roy knows that, Roy is tired, both physically and emotionally
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-04
Updated: 2018-06-04
Packaged: 2019-05-18 06:58:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14847935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emamel/pseuds/Emamel
Summary: There was someone in Roy's office when he woke up.Or; Roy meets Ed for the first time. It goes only slightly better than anyone expected.





	Prepare A Face To Meet The Faces That You Meet

**Author's Note:**

> So this was actually the first thing of this verse I started writing, and since I had it almost finished, figured I might as well spam you all. Oops. When I started, I wondered what Roy's reaction to Ed would have been if he hadn't already seen the human transmutation circle- if he'd still be so eager to recruit him. I figured maybe not. Also, the idea of Roy trying to be a responsible adult figure and look out for two boys that are several times his age was really funny to me.
> 
> Still dicking about with FMA logic, science, canon, timelines, etc :)

There was someone in Roy’s office when he woke up. For a moment, he didn’t react – while not precisely common, it wasn’t unheard of for Hawkeye to let herself in and out as she pleased, usually bringing him more work, and (if she was feeling particularly magnanimous) a cup of coffee. So, the glimpse of blonde hair hanging over the arm of his sofa wasn’t enough to make him do more than hum and blink slowly.

 

The automail leg propped on his coffee table, just in his vision and bouncing with an off-kilter rhythm? That had him jerking upright with a shout and reaching for his gun. No time to be fiddling around with ignition gloves when he could just shoot the intruder.

 

The bouncing stopped.

 

A hand – automail again, dark sleeve pushed up to the elbow to clearly display the smooth plates of the forearm – gripped at the sofa so his guest could push himself up far enough to meet Mustang’s flinty gaze.

 

“Shit,” said the boy – boy! – flopping back down and pillowing his head with his other, flesh, arm. “I heard you were jumpy but that’s just rude.”

 

Roy took a deep breath that absolutely didn’t tremble in his throat.

 

“Who are you?” He asked tightly, eyes flicking to the door, then the clock, never leaving the stranger for longer than a second. It was still lunch – he couldn’t have been asleep long, and it would explain why none of his team had come bursting into the room at the sound of his yell. But there should still be guards on every gate into Eastern Command, as well as soldiers patrolling the grounds and hallways. A kid shouldn’t be able to waltz in here and wander around as he damn well pleased. “What do you want?”

 

The boy's hand waved lazily, dismissing his questions, metal on metal clicking faintly in the otherwise silent room. Roy stood slowly, sidling around until he could see the boy properly.

 

Black trousers rolled up to the knees and thick-soled boots kicked lazily to the end of the sofa were the first things he noticed, followed swiftly by the mismatched limbs and rumpled shirt. The intruder looked as though he’d been as fast asleep as Roy. The long hair that had, in his mostly-asleep mind so resembled Hawkeye’s, was a few shades darker he could see now; almost perfectly gold. The boy wasn’t looking at him directly, but rather peering at him from the corner of his eyes, face still tilted up towards the ceiling. Roy coked his pistol, although he knew – knew full well – that he would never pull the trigger on a teenager like this. Not again.

 

Didn’t matter if he would or not. What mattered was that the boy believed it.

 

The amused glint on the boy’s face dimmed, his mouth flattening and brows pulling together briefly, furiously.

 

“Fuckin’ seriously?” He asked. His eyes flicked towards the gun for less than a second before apparently dismissing it in favour of watching Roy again. “You invite me here and this is the kinda welcome I get?”

 

He levered himself upright, scrubbed a hand through his hair until it fell around his face to his apparent satisfaction, and reached into his shirt pocket. Roy had already judged it too small and flat to conceal a weapon, but still he found himself tensing in spite of his better judgement. Like a hound scenting blood, those unsettling eyes snapped back to Roy’s frame, trailing lazily across his shoulders and seemingly taking note of every knotted muscle hidden under layers of starched military blues. The boy grinned like this was the most entertaining thing he had seen for days, pulling a badly crumpled letter free of the fabric.

 

Even where it was half-hidden in his clenched fist, Roy could make out his own writing.

 

_Edward and Alphonse,_ it said in his cramped, rushed cursive. Roy found himself taking another of those deep, steadying breaths.

 

“Are you trying to tell me,” he said, measuring each word carefully before spitting it out in defeat. “That you are one of the brothers from Resembool?” One of the brothers rumoured to perform alchemy that made even Roy’s mind boggle; one of the brothers that had been, by all accounts accidentally, making a name for themselves for years throughout the Eastern region. One of the brothers that had been travelling for half a decade before Roy managed to catch up to the rumours long enough to find their semi-permanent base of operations. When he had arrived there, he had found only echoes where the brothers should be – a glimpse of a vast library tucked away in the back rooms of an automail workshop, a pile of letters addressed to them gathering dust on the mantlepiece, and a firecracker of a woman that tapped ash from her pipe onto Roy’s boot as she bustled him out of the door.

 

“Call me Ed,” the boy grinned, throwing the letter down on the table like a challenge, and leaning forward with his metal arm outstretched; as though he honestly expected Roy to shake his hand.

 

He couldn’t quite bring himself to go that far, but he did, at least, flick the safety back on his pistol and sit warily across from the – from _Ed_.

 

From the look in his gold eyes, Ed was pleased with Roy’s reaction. Whatever that test had been, he had passed – though perhaps not quite with flying colours. Ed sat back, tugging his boots on before immediately propping his feet up on the table, mud smearing across the discarded letter; despite his display of carelessness, there was a coiled energy about him. Roy knew that if it came down to it, if he aimed his gun again with intent to pull the trigger, Ed would be ready for it.

 

“Look, I’m not going to waste your time,” Ed said, head tilted just slightly so he wasn’t completely face-on with Roy again; the look of a predator. He ran his tongue over his teeth briefly. “Neither of us are gonna go for the state shit.”

 

“No,” Roy agreed faintly, finally holstering his pistol and leaning his elbows against his thighs. Ed’s confidence wasn’t teenage bravado – it was the same battle-hardened look he had seen in Ishval, on soldiers and civilians alike that had been tried and tested and broken down to be built anew. If Ed were to decide to attack, the pistol wouldn’t be quick enough. But despite that, he couldn’t, _couldn’t_ drop a child into the life of a state alchemist. Not now, when there were so many border skirmishes poised to devolve into all-out war; not with the increasingly worrying messages Hughes was receiving from the contacts he still refused to admit he had. Ed’s brows appeared to try to lift in surprise and furrow in suspicion at the same time, with the net result an expression that made him look like he was trying to stare into bright sunlight. This lasted a couple of seconds before his mouth twisted.

 

“Alright, there is _no way_ this conversation should be so easy,” he hissed. “Spit it out – what’s your game?”

 

“My game?” Roy repeated. His side of the conversation was beginning to feel concerningly monosyllabic. He had a reputation as a charmer and – if not great then at least passable – wit for a reason. He wasn’t sure if it was the shock of the situation finally catching up to him, or if this was just the sort of effect Ed had on people.

 

“Yeah, your game – your play, your angle, your fuckin’ _scheme_ ,” Ed elaborated, suddenly impatient. “You wouldn’t just drop it like that, so _what are you planning_?”

 

Roy chose not to point out that before Ed had turned up in his office, he hadn’t been planning anything – had put the brothers to the back of his mind as a last-resort should they return home to find his letter. He also felt it would probably be detrimental to his health to use Ed’s age as an excuse. So –

 

“State alchemists _are_ afforded a number of privileges,” Roy said, folding his fingers together and wishing – wishing _so hard_ – that he was wearing his gloves. His very own little security blankets, as Hughes called them. “But that doesn’t change the fact that they aren’t generally trusted by the public, and it can make any sort of independent work or research exceedingly difficult. From what I understand, you and brother take out contracts throughout the Eastern Region?”

 

Ed shrugged, the motion careless though his catlike eyes were intent on Roy’s face.

 

“Something like that,” he said, and wouldn’t elaborate. Roy nodded.

 

“Then you likely don’t need the stipend and, to be honest, I don’t really think there’s much more for you to gain from joining.” _Unless you like mountains of paperwork and the occasional genocide,_ he carefully didn’t add. Somehow, he got the impression that Ed had heard it anyway. The smile that spread across his face was slightly feral, slightly too wide, and would have made Roy’s knees shake if he were standing. These days, there wasn’t much he was afraid of – the sheer scope of the potential in that grin rocketed straight to the top ten.

 

“Hell of a recruitment speech there, Colonel,” Ed said. “But fuck, it works I guess. Exam’s pretty soon. You gonna come watch? It _was_ your idea after all. At least, that’s what I’ll tell ‘em when they ask.”

 

And – wait, what, no. Roy must have had a stroke sometime in the last minute, because he was pretty certain that was the _exact opposite_ of what he just said. Ed shouldn't even be _thinking_ about the exam, never mind seriously entering himself for it.

 

It didn’t matter, Roy told himself. The exam was in two weeks’ time; there was no way for Ed to submit his application this late and still be considered. But there was still a gleam in those eyes, and his mouth pulled deeper into a smirk the longer Roy watched. It was with a sinking feeling in his gut that he started to realise what, exactly, had transpired.

 

Roy had been played. Roy had been played and he _hadn’t even known it._ Either he was losing his touch, or he was _really_ losing his touch.

 

“I’ll be there,” he agreed finally, knowing as he did that he would regret it.

 

Ed stood, stretched, and shrugged on the coat – dark tan, it trailed to his calves and looked like it would be wide enough to wrap around him twice – that he had, apparently, been using as a cushion until now. He tucked his right hand deep in his pocket and clapped Roy’s shoulder cheerfully as he wandered past.

 

“Good talk,” he said brightly, yanking the door open hard enough that it bounced off the wall and rattled on its hinges. Roy cringed, then continued cringing when he saw his team’s incredulous faces on the other side. Loyal his team may be, they were still incurably nosy.

 

“See you there, yeah?” he called back over his shoulder, steps uneven but gait quick and deceptively fluid. “Just ask for Elric!”

 

Roy sighed and dropped his head into his hands.

 

He should’ve just gone back to sleep.

 

* * *

 

 

Despite Hawkeye’s griping, and the reputation they had banded together to so carefully craft for him, Roy was very rarely late unless he had planned it that way.

 

The recent academy graduates stood stiffly at the gates of Central command didn’t know that. A look at his red face, heaving breaths and the silver watch he thrust in their faces had them exchanging wide-eyed glances and hurrying him through the doors mere minutes before Ed’s practical exam was due to begin. He laughed breathlessly and waved away their concerns, bemoaning his own lack of planning and time-management, and pretending that he wasn’t desperately afraid of the results of this exam. As soon as they turned to leave him, he straightened up and tugged at his uniform until even Hawkeye couldn’t have found fault with it, before gritting his teeth and heading onto the observation floor.

 

He had barely made it in time because he didn’t want to run the risk of bumping into Ed before the exam, in front of a guard that would expect him to have met the boy more than once, and actually know the first damn thing about him.

 

Honestly, Roy wasn’t even sure what story Ed had fed the admissions office to get himself a place in the exam. It was fortunate, he reflected, that word of Ed’s age hadn’t spread, or the room would be packed with curious officials all dying to say they had witnessed the practical of the youngest state applicant in history.

 

In the room below, Ed’s uneven steps rang across the hall; maybe it was just Roy’s mind playing tricks on him, but he thought it seemed more pronounced now than it had in his office. He looked almost exactly as Roy remembered him, which was unsettling – he had been hoping that in his half-asleep state he had exaggerated Ed’s youth. The thick soles of his boots brought him to almost shoulder-height with his guards; his shirt now was sleeveless, coat apparently abandoned in favour of flaunting his automail all the way up to the port bolted into his shoulder. His guards – nominally there to counter and reverse any damage done by an out-of-control transmutation – stood back just far enough to give him room to draw an array and not a step further. They glanced between the Fuhrer and the child, as though expecting Bradley to burst into his hearty gales of laughter and announce the whole thing an elaborate set-up. If Roy hadn’t known better, he might have suspected the same thing. Bradley’s own guards were better disciplined than that, but even they seemed uneasy.

 

“Did you bring something to draw an array with?” While it was likely meant to be a whisper, sound carried oddly throughout the chamber, almost enough to leave Roy’s ears ringing. Ed’s indelicate snort was no better.

 

“Did I _hell_ ,” he replied, uncaring of the way his voice echoed, and slammed his bare palms together. He dropped to his knees, and the blue flashes of alchemical reaction leant his face sharp edges where before childish roundness had lingered. From the floor, a wicked looking spear formed, the movement of the stone almost liquid under his hands.

 

Furious muttering broke out around Roy, and even he could feel himself leaning forward, the blood draining from his face. Ed hadn’t left his arms bare for the purpose of displaying his metal limb – or not just that, at least. His arms were clear, bare of tattoos or etchings or any markings that might hide a transmutation circle. An alchemist that didn’t rely on physical arrays would be terrifying on the battlefield; versatile, unpredictable and staggeringly difficult to defend against. There was a sick feeling beginning to form in the very pit of his stomach that was countered by a kind of breathless excitement.

 

Because Ed had listed _him_ as his sponsor – or something similar enough, at least, that Bradley would be obligated to place Ed under his command. An alchemist of this level…

 

Ed surged forward almost before the transmutation was complete, the light dying away seconds later. Roy flinched back – no matter how talented Ed was, it didn’t matter if he was dead at the hands of the Fuhrer’s guards. But the point of the spear stopped inches from Bradley’s chin where it rested for a moment, before Ed stepped back and neatly caught the tip of the spear when it slid away from the whole. His head tilted. Roy was pretty sure he knew how Ed would be looking at the Fuhrer now – eyes narrowed, mouth twisted to show teeth. The Fuhrer’s sword glinted at his side in the light streaming in through the high windows. Bradley’s smile hadn’t changed, even as he waved his guards away, despite their obvious reluctance.

 

Apparently they didn’t share Roy’s reserves when it came to the thought of shooting a teenager.

 

“Impressive,” Bradley rumbled, eye slipping a little further closed as his smile widened. Ed shifted his weight, clapped and set the butt of the spear down – there was the faintest ripple across the floor as the stones shifted to fill the hole halfway across the room, and settle the spear into the ground at his feet. It was remarkably well controlled given the area he had covered, the rest of the floor untouched despite the waves of energy Roy could feel crackling through the air and raising the hairs on his arms. Ed leaned back onto his automail leg and nodded once, quick and sharp.

 

“You too,” he offered; his tone of voice suggested he was grinning, as though he wasn’t speaking to the most politically powerful man in the country. “Pretty quick.”

 

Bradley laughed aloud at that.

 

“You are certainly very talented, but you still have much to learn, young alchemist,” he said, turning his back to Ed and walking away – a clear display of exactly how much of a threat he felt Ed was. Surprisingly, Ed didn’t seem put out by this. When he turned to scan the watching officials, he looked smug. He caught Roy’s gaze for a moment, jerked his head towards the door, and wandered out.

 

As quickly as dignity would allow him, Roy strode towards the main doors leading outside, unsurprised to see that Ed was already stood on the steps, head back as though he was basking in the midmorning sun. He turned before Roy had the chance to call out to him, a wariness in his gaze and posture that hadn’t been present before. Roy waited until he was close enough that he could have reached out and rested a hand on Ed’s shoulder – though he valued his hands too much to try – before murmuring,

 

“A little warning next time?”

 

“Ain’t gonna _be_ a next time, Colonel,” Ed said, turning a little more towards Roy and a smirk starting to pull at his cheeks. “Fuckin’ _aced_ it.”

 

Roy acknowledged this with a grim disbelief. Any hopes – distant though they were – of Ed somehow not being the prodigy his customers claimed him to be were long since dashed.

 

“Speaking of,” he said, gesturing towards the main street and starting to walk when Ed showed no sign of moving. “I’ve never seen anyone transmute without an array like that – I don’t think I’ve even _heard_ of anyone doing it.”

 

“Yeah, well.” Ed paused. Sucked in a breath. Waited a moment. “We live in strange times. Besides. Not something you want to brag about, y’know?”

 

“No, I can’t say I do,” Roy said drily. “Why wouldn’t you want anyone to know?”

 

“Not the sort of knowledge a person just stumbles on,” Ed said after a thoughtful silence. “Can you keep a secret, Colonel? Shit, wait, ‘course you can. Keeping lots of things secret, I bet.” His gaze, for a moment, turned cunning. “You didn’t look all that upset at the thought of Bradley getting shanked. Some loyal dog you are.” Roy almost stopped dead in the street before huffing a little.

 

“Was it really that obvious?”

 

“Didn’t I _just say_ you can keep secrets? It’s not obvious unless you know what to look for.”

 

Was Ed trying to reassure him? Roy supposed he appreciated the effort, but Ed wasn’t particularly skilled at it. Still – he’d allowed himself to be distracted.

 

“The arrays?”

 

Ed’s eyes narrowed and his cheek twitched, like he was chewing on the inside of it. Roy wondered if he had always been this difficult to talk to, or if it was the result of years of dedicating himself to study and alchemy. His posture had shifted to something wary, and he was walking much closer to the wall than he had been a moment ago, Roy realised. As though he was preparing to transmute an escape route that Roy couldn’t follow. Or a weapon, if the spear had been any indication of whether he favoured fight or flight.

 

“Look, Colonel, I don’t wanna lie to you; too much fuckin’ effort. But I don’t really trust you yet, see? Like, you got your agenda, fine, whatever. And until I figure out where you factor me and Al in that, this trust thing? Not happening.” It was perhaps the most words Roy had heard from Ed in one go. He opened his mouth – either to point this out or acknowledge that Ed was perhaps justified in his mistrust, he hadn’t yet decided – but surprisingly Ed spoke again before he could. “Guess we’ll find out if Al was right to pick you soon enough.”

 

Ed scuffed the toe of his boots against the pavement for a couple of steps, looking every inch a teenager waiting to be scolded. It was such an abrupt shift from the brash, almost arrogant air he’d had before that Roy had to stop himself from reaching out.

 

“It’s not easy to talk about,” he muttered sullenly. “And if we weren’t so desperate I wouldn’t even consider this, but here we are. So. What did you dig up on us?”

 

Roy didn’t do Ed the disservice of pretending he didn’t know what he was talking about.

 

“Almost nothing,” he sighed. “Testimonials from your customers – although none of them know enough about alchemy to think the lack of array worth mentioning, it seems. I briefly met Mrs. Rockbell – your mechanic, I presume – but she wouldn’t tell me anything about the two of you before throwing me out.” Ed near cackled at that, despite the lingering sense of unease that hung over the conversation.

 

“But searching through records, censuses… there was nothing.” He had been incensed for _days_ after Breda, Falman, _and_ Hughes had all reported back with the same defeated tone.

 

“Grew up in a little town,” Ed shrugged. “Out of the way. Overlooked a lot. Me and Al and mum, mostly. Dad walked out. He was an alchemist – we taught ourselves using his books. But mum was… She wasn’t well, not for a long time. And we tried our best, but we weren’t so good at medical alchemy. And then, we were too late anyway.”

 

When he turned to look at Roy, whose face had frozen with the beginnings of horror churning in his gut, Ed’s eyes were flat, and so very tired. It was the first time he had faced Roy completely, shoulders squared and expression heavy with old regret.

 

He really didn’t want to hear the rest of this story.

 

“Took us a couple’a years to go through all his notes and shit,” Ed continued, turning away at last and hiding his expression behind his hair. Roy felt like he was back in Ishval, under the desert sun with lungs full of sand and smoke with no room left for air. “D’you realise how cheap humans are? In their component parts, I mean. Should probably look into that, Colonel. Anyone could get their hands on them. Equivalent exchange for the body's pretty basic. But the rest of a person? A soul?” Ed laughed, the sound too sharp. Humourless.

 

“Shit, how are you supposed to put a price on that? Still haven’t managed to figure it out. We got off pretty light, I guess.”

 

Could an arm and a leg be considered getting off light? Roy supposed so, given the usual cost of human transmutation. That the boys had been even somewhat successful, and survived the attempt…

 

It was no wonder Ed was so hesitant to trust him. If the brass got word of this, the brothers would never see daylight again.

 

“When you do human transmutation, there’s something that goes wrong,” Ed said slowly, chewing over the words. “Besides the obvious, I mean. And part of that is what lets someone transmute without a physical array. As long as I know what the array I want to use is, I sort of _am_ the formula, and close the circle with my hands, see?” He clapped as though to demonstrate; possibly the closest thing he had to a nervous tic.

 

There were so many ways to respond to the barrage of information. For a moment, Roy savoured the idea of yanking at his hair and screaming at the mess his life had devolved into so quickly. Briefly, he considered making his way to Xing and living out the rest of his days far away from teenagers that tried to play god, and – if Ed was to be believed – came closer to succeeding than anyone else in recorded history. But that would be doing a disservice to the brothers. Their brush with hell was different to his own, but that didn’t make it any less horrifying.

 

Roy gave himself a chance to recover, to look away from Ed and his guarded stance, and glanced around, realising as he did that they had wandered into a part of town he never would have dreamed of coming to alone if it could be avoided. The ramshackle houses cast long shadows over cramped alleyways where hunched figures stared warily at the two of them. It was an area known for housing a number of veterans and refugees alike from all around the border of Amestris – usually they came to central with hopes of finding some kind of recompense for the lives they’d had destroyed. Very few ever found anything, and most of them had used up what little they had left making their way to the city in the first place.

 

It turned Roy’s stomach – particularly the occasional glimpse of white hair or red eyes hidden beneath deep hoods.

 

Even now, he wasn’t sure if it was guilt that made him stay away, or the blatant hatred of all things military shared by all of the residents. He cursed himself under his breath – he should have known better than to let Ed distract him as they walked. Ed strode on, either unconcerned by or unaware of the furious whispers following them.

 

Roy almost tripped over the boy when he veered sharply to the left, down an alleyway barely wide enough for the two of them, and came to a halt in from of a battered iron door. He thumped twice with his automail hand.

 

The door cracked open just far enough to reveal a golden eye – the colour identical to Ed’s, and almost certainly belonging to his brother – before it swung back and Roy got a good luck at the second Elric boy.

 

Inanely, the first thing that Roy really noticed was the fact that he stood several centimetres taller than his brother, and perhaps a little naturally broader across the shoulders. His clothes were muted, earthen tones that would do nothing to help him blend with a crowd given that he also shared Ed’s unusual skin and hair. Those eyes – almost as unsettling as Ed’s, though perhaps a touch less wild – flicked between Roy and his brother once, twice, before a long-suffering expression dragged at his mouth. He inclined his head politely to Roy and dug his fingers into the meat of Ed’s shoulder to drag him inside.

 

“I’m very sorry for anything that’s come out of brother’s mouth today,” he said, his tone bizarrely formal for such a young voice. “He has no sense of propriety.”

 

Alphonse Elric, Roy realised, was most likely the reason Ed hadn’t been killed in a fit of pique yet.

 

“The _fuck_ Al, I-”

 

“Not at all,” Roy interrupted, and noted the furious shade of red that was beginning to creep up Ed’s neck and ears with interest. He shrugged off his brother’s hand and stormed into the little back room – two beds, one neatly made and the other with blankets strewn half across the floor, a suitcase laying open and vulnerable to Ed’s automail foot as he kicked it across the floor. “It’s been… educational.”

 

Alphonse’s smile was wry.

 

“You don’t need to be so diplomatic,” he said, and didn’t flinch at the loud bang and immediate string of vicious swearing that echoed through the small house. Roy was impressed. He hadn’t heard cursing that creative since Hughes phoned him at three in the morning in a panic over his sudden status as a father. Baseless, of course; the man was a natural. Alphonse gestured to the hastily hand-repaired table and chairs, and Roy gratefully took a seat – Central was always so exhausting. “Brother isn’t really used to talking to anyone but me if he can avoid it – to be honest, I’m quite proud. I was sure he’d have left you behind as soon as the exam was finished.”

 

“I had a lot of questions for him,” Roy said, as though he could have forced Ed to talk if the boy really didn’t want to. He’d barely known him five minutes, and already he could envision all too well how that would pan out. “He explained about… his alchemy.”

 

Roy had to fight not to stumble over his words as bile crept up the back of his throat again. Alphonse slumped, something amused and so, so sad in his voice.

 

“Did he really?”

 

And Roy… didn’t really know how to respond to that. “I’m not planning on turning either of you in, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he said at last. Alphonse’s smile was only a little wry, and oddly unconcerned.

 

“If we thought that could be a problem, we wouldn’t have gone to you,” he said, and again didn’t react to Ed thudding back into the room, hair down and grumbling under his breath about the exam. Alphonse breathed the heavy sigh of someone that had heard similar rants enough that they could repeat them verbatim, but made the odd sympathetic noise when Ed paused for breath. Once he seemed to finally run out of steam, he tumbled into the chair next to his brother; Alphonse shifted far enough across on the seat that Ed could prop his automail foot up on it.

 

It was an oddly unsettling image when both brothers turned to look at him, gaze assessing but not nearly as hostile as he’d been expecting. Ed, who seemed to radiate caution and ill-temper when marching through the streets of Central, had slumped back into his chair and started to rub not-quite-absent-mindedly at a spot on his left thigh. A tension that had been present even in Roy’s office had drained away. He looked exhausted.

 

Alphonse was perhaps a little harder to read – but then, Roy had no frame of reference for his behaviour in the big wide world, away from his brother. Here, he seemed relaxed enough, but Roy hadn’t missed the faintest etchings around the window-frames and doors – trap circles. They were small enough that he couldn’t make out a lot of detail at this distance, though he was fairly certain they would appear deceptively simple, despite how difficult he knew it was to create an array that would only activate if specific conditions were met. As though he’d needed further proof of their aptitude.

 

Despite the signs of alchemic repair to the floors and walls, and the security measures, everything else Roy could see scattered around seemed handmade; fairly inexpertly in some cases. He resolved to ask about it one day, if Ed ever managed to let his guard down completely.

 

They were _still looking at him_ Roy realised suddenly, with their eerily symmetrical gold eyes. He managed not to clear his throat uncomfortably, but it was a close call.

 

Surprisingly, it was Ed that looked away first. He huffed and levered himself to his feet, movements a little stiff – the house was damp and draughty, and Roy wouldn’t be surprised if the cold seeped into the automail. It begged the question of why they didn’t stay at a hotel; he was fairly sure they could afford it. After a couple of steps, though, his movements appeared to free up, and he darted around the room restlessly. Alphonse, unlike his brother, didn’t seem to feel the need to be moving constantly. Roy couldn’t even see the motion of his breathing.

 

“How long do you think you’ll be in Central?” Alphonse asked abruptly. Behind him, Ed was rummaging through the cupboards, sorting through stacks of non-perishables and putting several aside, presumably to be cooked. Roy tried not to pay attention to how rapidly the pile was growing.

 

“Your brother’s certification should be announced in three days, so I’ll be staying until then,” he replied. There was plenty to keep him busy; to keep him from thinking too hard about what might have driven these boys here, to him, to his somewhat dubious protection. As much as he hated not knowing, it would be fruitless to ask – that much was obvious already.

 

Besides, if he was in the mood for a little self-recrimination, he could always visit his aunt – no doubt she would be happy to assist, eyes bright with supressed mirth all the while.

 

“We’ll see you in three days, then,” Ed said, a clear dismissal, without even turning to look at him. Alphonse shot an incredulous look over his shoulder -  it seemed he still had the capacity to be shocked by Ed’s manners. Roy fought to hide a smile. He’d met enough truly rude people in his life – both through his career and through Madame Christmas – and had enough people trying to suck up to him that Ed’s abrupt way of speaking was almost refreshing. Roy waved away Alphonse’s attempt to walk him to the door, pausing only to wish the brothers a pleasant day; manners, Madame Christmas always said, _matter_. Alphonse returned the well wishes hastily, while Ed muttered a distracted _yeah, yeah_ from his place by the rusted stove.

 

Once he’d closed the door behind him, Roy hesitated, straining to hear the muffled voices that started up immediately on the other side. He may have been raised well-mannered, but that was not always the same as well-behaved, and he was not above a little eavesdropping. For a moment, there was nothing more than the impression of voices, too soft to even distinguish between them. Then –

 

“I don’t _give_ a shit! He doesn’t have to like us, Al!”

 

“No, he doesn’t have to, but our lives will be much easier if he does!”

 

“Since when have our lives been _easy_?”

 

“That’s my _point_ brother! We’re already running out of time! I don’t want to be fighting the colonel every step of the way!”

 

“ _You_ won’t be! I’m the one stuck in this – ah shit, no, Al, I didn’t mean it like -”

 

Roy ducked his head and walked away. He didn’t think he wanted to hear any more.

**Author's Note:**

> Oh Roy. A soul will cost ya more than an arm and a leg. Incidentally, this is the first and last time Ed plays mind games with Mustang in this verse - he knows he isn't on Roy's level when it comes to scheming


End file.
